Dots 'n' Dolls

Get in free and early on a new design marketplace

2012-01-12T10:49:00.000+08:00

My digital scrapbooking sister just posted a link to Creative Market, a new venture from the team that made COLOURlovers. I really enjoy the COLOURlovers site. It's a wonderful resource for making and finding colour schemes and patterns and I've used it for coordinating my party theme to making stickers for a friend's kitchen tea gift.

Creative Market sounds like it could be a cool place to find some original design elements to work into logos or your own graphic designs. It's hoping to be the Etsy of digital handmade products. You can sign up now to get free credits and you can get more if you invite others to join but there's nothing to spend those credits on just yet. I'm going to be keeping my eye on this one.

Here's my invite link: http://creativemarket.com/uMdAR8l

Check it out and let me know what you think. What are your favourite places to find design elements?

Till next time,
Lauren

Deeper (by Parachute Band)

2011-11-10T19:45:00.001+08:00

Book Review: Giving Sorrow Words

2011-07-13T10:54:00.003+08:00

by Melinda Tankard Reist

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is an intense read. I will now live with imagery that cannot be erased but I am glad I read this book. It opens up a whole new world on the other side of abortion that I had not considered, despite my strongly held beliefs about abortion.

The book includes many testimonies between a heart-breaking introduction including excerpts from other stories that couldn't be included in the book and an information-packed afterword discussing some studies done in the area of abortion-grief.

This book is worth-while, especially if you seek to understand the choices around abortion more completely.

View all my reviews

A festival of ideas

2011-07-12T11:54:00.001+08:00

Coming up on the 15th of August, the Big Idea Festival will be my first course or workshop through Big Picture Classes. I love words and I love visual art so this free workshop that challenges you to create 12 scrapbooking layouts based on word prompts seems like a fun collision of these two words.

I dance free

2011-06-10T19:27:00.000+08:00

In so many ways, you loved me

Just as I am not as I should be

And as your child, you take hold of me

I see just why I fall in love with you

The purest love I've ever know

Was that you chose to give and die

And the blood that poured from your open hand

All so I could fall in love with you

I've got worship you my God

I can't contain the way I feel

I dance free

Before you Lord

For it's you

That I adore

Adore by the Parachute Band

A dress, a brolly and writing letters

2011-05-10T15:26:00.001+08:00

Writing letters dress from Ruche

White tutus, feathers and patience

2011-05-07T11:12:00.001+08:00

Getting things done

2011-05-06T15:32:00.000+08:00

It certainly is a wonderful feeling to get to the end of the day and feel like you got things done. And not just things but important things that you care about having done—whether it's because you love it or because you must care. To that end, we look to a recent Unclutterer post: Four reasons you may be missing deadlines and how to fix these problems.

I found it an excellent read. Since studying at university, I have begun to appreciate things tend to take longer than I expect and I can never fit as much into one day as I am tempted to plan. My big one at the moment is what Unclutterer terms "impulse control".

At my previous job—a rather tedious data entry role—I found it a challenge to stay on task with mountains of interest waiting to be climbed just a Google search away. So I developed the habit of writing down whatever was threatening my concentration with the intent that I might look into it later. In the end, I seldom cared to look it up anyway!

Since then that habit has fallen by the wayside of general use but I'll pull it out every now and then, on a particularly slow day. My current impulse curbing plan is limiting Facebook visits to one per day. I have quite a few sites that could benefit from such a rule but, let's start slowly, okay?

Successful Sunday baking experiments

2011-04-14T11:46:00.000+08:00

The other week week I was reading a new addition to my RSS feeds, The Giant Blog of Cooking, Crafting and Other Fun Activities, I came across her recipe for giant pretzels. This was something I'd not tried before so I made a plan to attempt these the following Sunday.

A walk down to the local supermarket for some yeast was the first step and then I got into baking!

Bubbling, growing yeast

Ingredients
(reproduced from GBCCOFA)
2 1/4 tsp. active dry yeast, or 1 packet
2 Tbsp. brown sugar
1 1/8 tsp salt
1 1/2 c. warm water, about 110 degrees F
3 c. flour
1 c. bread flour
2 c. warm water
2 Tbsp baking soda
3 Tbsp melted butter
Coarse Kosher Salt

Notes
I used 3 cups of plain flour instead of part bread flour. My warm water was around 50°C. Finally, I just used regular salt from my grinder in place of the Kosher salt. Oh, and I used Lowan Instant Dried Yeast.

Method
Combine water, sugar, yeast and salt and leave for about 10 minutes till it's bubbling.
Add flour and mix with a dough hook till it reaches an elastic consistency.
Cover mix in oil and leave to rise for about an hour.

Rising dough

Combine warm water and baking soda (or bi-carb) in a dish and set up your pretzel production line!
Separate dough into 12 parts and roll till almost 3 feet (a bit under a metre long).

The pretzel production line

Shape the pretzels then dip in the baking-soda-water mix and lay on a tray.
Bake at 230°C until crispy and brown.

Ready to come out of the oven

Add whatever topping you like. The blog suggested butter and salt so that's what I used. Plus I love my butter! One suggestion from a friend who tried them was sugar and cinnamon with butter or syrup to make it stick.

Giant pretzels

ABCs

2011-04-08T12:19:00.000+08:00

Meme stolen from Rainbows & Thunderstorms.

Age: 20

Bed Size: Single

Chore I Hate: Filling the car with petrol!

Dogs: One family dog, Stephanie

Essential Start of Your Day: Journalling and quiet time

Favorite Color: Yellow

Gold or Silver: Silver

Height: 5'5

Instruments I Play: Keyboard (piano when at home alone!)

Job Title: Receptionist/secretary but it will be Graduate Accountant next year

Kids: 0

Live: Australia

Mom's Name: Mum!

Nicknames: Loz, Loza, Lol, Lollie

Overnight Hospital Stays: 0

Pet Peeve: People being unwilling to listen to other's opinions but at the same time, people repeating their opinion needlessly! A bit of a conflict there!

Quote From a Movie: '...but the number of engagements that go on seem to me to be considerably above the proper average that statistics have laid down for our guidance.' - Judy Dench as Lady Bracknell in the Importance of Being Earnest

Right- or Left-Handed: Right

Siblings: 2 sisters, 3 brothers

Time You Wake Up: 7am pretty consistently with the occasional Saturday sleep in

Underwear: Bonds Hipster

Veggie You Dislike: Green Beans

What Makes You Run Late: Nine extra minutes in bed after hitting snooze

X-Rays You Have Had: for my wisdom teeth extraction I had one that swiveled around my head

Yummy Food You Make: Chocolate fudge brownies

Zoo Animal You Like Best: pygmy lemurs! Also, I would love to see the red pandas--or, firefoxes!

Courtesy Plus Pets

I do indeed

2011-04-07T17:52:00.000+08:00

It must be autumn: Pumpkin Soup

2011-04-06T11:29:00.000+08:00

Autumn has won the battle for my favourite season. I love the weather, the fashions and the food, especially pumpkin soup. I decided to make some a few Sundays ago and found a recipe for red lentil and pumpkin soup on the always handy recipe site, Taste.com.au. After a post-church pumpkin buying excursion with a friend, I made a few modifications, incorporating the ingredients we had on hand at home and some suggestions from other Taste users to make my Hot Pumpkin and Lentil Soup.

Ingredients and trusty "recipe book" all ready to go

Ingredients
2 tbsp olive oil
1 brown onion
1.4 kg pumpkin
3/4 cup red lentils
2 medium carrots
1 tbsp curry powder
10g vegetable stock powder
5g garlic butter
1.3 litres water

Fry onion then add curry powder

Method
1. Fry onion until just browning or getting soft
2. Add curry powder and garlic butter
3. Add 300 mL of water
4. Add washed red lentils and allow to soften while preparing vegetables
5. Chop pumpkin and soften slightly in microwave with a dash of water
6. Same for carrots

Leave covered to simmer

7. Add vegetables, remaining litre of water and vegetable stock powder
8. Bring to boil and then allow to simmer until pumpkin, carrot and lentils are fully softened
9. Blend soup in portions -- however much your blender will take!

Blend, blend, blend

10. Leave to simmer and thicken. Serve warm with a dolop of sour cream if you wish

Hot Pumpkin and Lentil Soup

Notes
It makes quite a spicy soup and next time I think I'll halve the curry powder and add more carrots and pumpkin. After 3-4 servings, I added another half a kilo of pumpkin. It probably gave around 15 serves of just under 200g each.

'Bones' by Hilsong United

2011-04-05T12:32:00.000+08:00

Design elements I love

2011-04-01T15:46:00.000+08:00

I've been exploring my growing love of design since starting my job at my church and working on the newsletter but especially so over the last few weeks.

Fonts are my favourite part of design. I love getting the right font to capture the subject matter of a uni assignment or express the theme of a story in the display font I use on the title of the draft. And don't even start about Comic Sans!

My next love is colour. Finding a collection of colours that fit together just right is so satisfying. But then I often get frustrated in the search for 'original' colours to differentiate my work from the stuff I've done before.

Clean lines are gorgeous. I think this leads me to love neat-and-tidy fonts such as Century Gothic. As a contrast, I also enjoy antique-inspired shapes and flourishes, including beautiful architecture.

Shoes + stationary

2011-03-31T15:31:00.000+08:00

The stationary geek and shoe lover in me may be a little in love right now.

Cute and useful. Just a little vivacious.

Too-wit, too-woo

2011-03-30T15:19:00.000+08:00

I've been gradually reworking my collection of RSS feeds in Google Reader to be only the things that really inspire and intrigue me. I'm trialling the inclusion of the blog print & pattern amongst them. My favourite discovery from this blog so far are some cute-as-anything owl themed plates by Donna Wilson:

My favourite plate is actually the Birdy Walk Dinner Plate. Such cute, simple, clean style.

Things to Love About Christmas

2010-12-06T13:38:00.000+08:00

1. Writing Christmas cards - The perfect excuse to appreciate the people in your life and tell them so

2. Baking Christmas treats - Delicious, seasonal, fun and perfect for presents that don't create clutter

3. Doing Christmas crafts - Traditional colours and symbols give even the most-uninspired something with which to create

4. Helping out those in need - Something about Christmas gets people excited about giving

To learn inspiration?

2010-11-11T11:52:00.000+08:00

Is it possible?

Even if it isn't, inspiration could be found within the folds of classwork. So why not check out Jessica Sprague's free Inspiration Everywhere class. I'll be there, 29th November. You could be too.

Practice your pliés

2010-09-19T10:51:00.000+08:00

Every small, repetitive step builds to the amazing, beautiful achievements.

Every plié and port de bra makes the grand jete easier.

Every scale on the piano makes improvisation second nature.

Every page of the textbook makes astounding progressions of logic possible.

Enjoy the achievements, remembering all the small steps that got you there. Take the small steps, thinking of the amazing things you're making possible.

Every plié...

The Beautiful Things

2010-06-19T14:58:00.000+08:00

I'd like to re-dedicate this blog to the beautiful things in life. Sometimes my interpretation of that might surprise you but I hope you're inspired anyway.

This blog is for Smiles, Baking, Arts & Crafts, Words, Pictures, Creation, Faith & Trust, Changing, Reflections, Looking Forward, Encouragement and Dancing.

It's for me, it's for you, it's for God.